Theologically the adoption of a belief that all have been made in the image of God can look like the opening lines of that Revised Preamble, which declares that this land was created and sustained by the Triune God who has been revealed by the Spirit to the people over thousands of years through their law, custom and ceremony. It also states that the love and grace of God “finally and fully revealed in Jesus Christ” gave them “particular insight into God’s ways.” This is significantly different thinking from that espoused by the colonial church. It requires that Aboriginal peoples be granted
14 Anne Pattel Gray, The Great White Flood: Racism in Australia; Critically Appraised from a Historico-Theological Viewpoint American Academy of Religion Cultural Criticism Series (Atlanta: Scholars, 1998).
15 Taken from a poster: “The Uniting Church in Australia Revised Preamble to the Constitution” (Sydney: Com- munications Unit of the Uniting Church in Australia Assembly, 2011).
16 Interestingly, it too in fact lies within Augustine’s work, as Ian Coats pointed out to my class, but was not includ- ed in his writing about the Antipodes.
17 For stories of some of these people see Reynolds, This Whispering in our Hearts. See also Tracy Spencer, White Lives in a Black Community: The lives of Jim Page and Rebecca Forbes in the Adnyamathanha Community (unpublished thesis, Flinders University, Adelaide, 2011).
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the deep respect, let alone the human rights, that an equal under God deserves, not because they think or operate the same as a person from another people group but because their unique perspective, wisdom and understanding has much to offer to all. Practically this requires from non-indigenous peoples a way of living that allows for genuine curiosity, mutuality, justice and love.
In 1999 Norman Habel introduced in a book three principles and two factors that he believed crucial to an “advocacy of authentic reconciliation,” which he argued was the answer to finding Australia’s lost soul.18The principles were truth, justice and identity.
The factors were forgiveness and suffering.
The truth principle Habel explained as allowing suppressed stories to be told in public, particularly by the oppressed, researching our history and reading it with new eyes as the historian Henry Reynolds has bravely done, and listening to local histories as Aboriginals tell them.
The justice principle then seeks to address past wrongs “by a mutually agreed procedure.”19 It rebalances power, restores rights long removed, and stops placing the
blame for their plight on the victims of the injustice. It cannot be achieved through a one-off act, like a public apology given by a Prime Minister, but is a long-term commitment to building a different kind of community.
The identity principle, meanwhile, asserts the equality of all parties. In the Australian context this is of vital importance because of a long history of assimilationist policies intent on making Aboriginal peoples “white.” It requires learning to understand and value “the mythic, spiritual and ritual tradition of Aboriginal peoples as integral to their identity.”20
In speaking of the forgiveness factor, Habel notes the ability of forgiveness to “heal past hurts” and mentions ritual as a useful medium for its realisation. Regarding suffering, he observes that without “suffering through” the pain of truth–telling, justice and forgiveness, “reconciliation” can prove to be false.
While these principles and factors are all true and important, I am left with the sense that something is missing. It is clear in Habel’s writing that the use of the pronoun “we” and the angle from which the principles and factors are approached is the voice,
18 Norman C Habel, Reconciliation: Searching for Australia’s Soul (Sydney: HarperCollins, 1999), 28ff. 19 Habel, Reconciliation, 37.
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perspective and activity of the non-indigenous person. Their thinking, words and actions are his concern: his own thinking, words and actions are his concern. He suggests that public rituals led by the church and other bodies can bring forgiveness and speaks of “my advocacy.” But is not forgiveness a gift bestowed on the wrong-doer by the wronged? Is not reconciliation a two-way process that needs the active will and involvement of all parties if it is to be effected, and so “my advocacy” for it is not enough? How, if the action is initiated and in large part controlled by the powerful (“my”, “we”), might change come in soul-full ways that create space for deep respect, genuine mutuality of engagement and a truly just society?
Perhaps the answer to these questions is implicit in Habel’s thinking and I have missed something.
My sense is that there is a precondition for truth, justice, identity, forgiveness and suffering and it is relationship. And I would suggest that because of the colonial history of which I am part, to build relationship in the interest of finding my soul in this land, three practices will first be required of me if “authentic reconciliation” is ever to become possible: listening, humility, and patience, or the ability to wait. In these practices power is set aside, even given away. In essence this is mission-in-reverse.